I, Lord Sava of Aggie, in the spirit of finding enjoyment in watching his subjects fight each other (and to encourage contest participation), hereby issues a challenge to the forum members of Classic-Castle.com.

I demand a set of 5 teams to vie for dominance within the Colossal Castle Contest VI!

One team shall represent the mighty King Mnementh the BronzeOne team shall represent the benevolent Lord Sava of AggieOne team shall represent the studious Precentor of the ScriptoriumOne team shall represent the couragous Chevalier de ChèvreAnd one team shall represent the evil Baron Von Ellermann

The winning team will be decided by the total number of team members who make the winners and runners up list at the end of the CCCVI.

Participation in this challenge is not a requirement to enter the CCCVI - this is merely for fun and 100% voluntary. The C-C Admins will not be in charge of the teams and it will not affect the final scores.

In order so that those who really want to participate may do so, on Wednesday, November 5th, sometime in the afternoon (US Central Time), I will post a sign up list. The first 30 members to sign up on the list will entered into the challenge, with 6 members per team (get it? - CCCVI, 6 members per team, get it? get it?). From those names, the members will be divided evenly and fairly between the Admins. If they so choose, the Admins may choose a team captain.

Do not sign up to this thread. You may, however, ask questions.

Edit -100 post or 1 year membership entry requirement removed.-Master Builders are not eligible to enter the challenge.

Again, the Admins will not be controlling the teams in any way, they will not give advice, guidance, or issue disputes. Team organization and participation is 100% up to the team members.

That being said, doesn't this bring into question the impartiality of the judges (hypothetically speaking of course). More specifically, I'm a bit concerned that members who aren't able to join a team (either because they miss this deadline, or because they don't meet the qualification criteria) may feel that they have been judged unfairly because they believe that the judges have focused predominantly on MOCs that were created by challenge members.

I'm curious as to why there is a cap on the number of participants. Why not open the contest up to all members who register by a designated deadline? Instead of imposing a cap on the number of participants, you Admins could simply hold a backroom draft where you take turns selecting your team-members. It's not as if we need to know the draft order. I'm just a bit apprehensive of having a contest-in-a-contest if only a small number of people are actually invited to participate.

I also feel that the contest should be open to former master builders. Why exclude them from participating considering how close some of the previous CCC's have been? I really love the idea, but I feel that the option to participate should be more open-ended.

Low number of participants is to make the "prize" more desirable and meaningful.

Master Builders, who know what the judges are looking for and have proven their skills as superior, would unfairly weight one team over another. I mean no disrespect to anyone in making this analogy, but you wouldn't want an MLB star on the roster of a little league team.

The judges have favorite builders, always have, but have never abandoned their impartiality. I have full faith that the judges will retain it this time around as well. Beyond which, remember, even if the judges did play favorites, it works both ways...

Team membership will not be reflected in any way on the contest page, it is a purely in-forum thing.

--Tony

Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day.Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

I read Anthony's post several times, and I did not see any requirements.

Did I miss something?

Anyway, would it be possible to create a private forum for each team? Based on my experience with other online team-based contests, I've found that a team discussion forum greatly increases participation and motivation.

Originally there was a requirement that in order to participate you had to have at least 100 posts or one year membership to C-C, so that there was a history fellow teammates could look back on and insure an air of trust from the get-go. This, however, was brought into question and then removed. I've re-edited my original post to reflect this to prevent further confusion.

rogue27 wrote:Anyway, would it be possible to create a private forum for each team? Based on my experience with other online team-based contests, I've found that a team discussion forum greatly increases participation and motivation.

Technically possible. This will have to be discussed by the Admin staff.

--Tony

Give a man a fire and he'll be warm for a day.Set a man on fire and he'll be warm for the rest of his life.

SavaTheAggie wrote:It has also been decided that the Mods will be in charge of decided which members will be assigned to which admin, since our impartiality seems to be in question.

Does that exclude Mods from participating?

Regarding impartiality, it seems like that will always be a concern no matter who chooses teams. I mean, what if I changed my sig to say, "Bruce is awesome". Would people still trust me to help choose teams?

SavaTheAggie wrote:It has also been decided that the Mods will be in charge of decided which members will be assigned to which admin, since our impartiality seems to be in question.

Does that exclude Mods from participating?

Regarding impartiality, it seems like that will always be a concern no matter who chooses teams. I mean, what if I changed my sig to say, "Bruce is awesome". Would people still trust me to help choose teams?

I too, read that and wondered if this meant the Mods were excluded from participation--in the past, after all, we had the freedom to enter the CCCs as if we were any other CC user.

Not that this is an issue for me, since I haven't entered ever, to speak of (though the thought is always present), so I've no problem adjudicating this, but that's just me.